This day the 2d Session of the Nineteenth Congress commenced. Whether the members
who compose it have come with a disposition to be more mild than they were last Winter
is yet to be seen. The { 91 } parties which now divide the nation, are pretty distinctly marked but not yet so much
so as to be able clearly to define which will prove the strongest. The governing party
seems however to be in the best spirits.2

1. From D/CFA/5. CFA read Plutarch in the morning and played cards with his family in
the evening (D/CFA/1).

2. The Southern supporters of Vice-President Calhoun and the Northern friends of Senator
Van Buren were coalescing against the National Republicans led by Henry Clay and JQA.
This new alliance of “southern planters and plain republicans of the North” became
the triumphant Democratic party of Andrew Jackson (Bemis, JQA, 2:77).